Paso was our last trip before everything shut down, but I agree that it is a great place to visit.

Paso has been my only California wine trip so far, but it's the trip that cemented me on my wine path.

The start was at Black Mesa Winery in NM where we did a vertical tasting from juice to bottled finished wine and all steps in between.

If push comes to shove, the Hill Country has lots to offer. Many, many VRBO, B&B to choose from. Lots of wineries, admittedly many very pedestrian, but enough good to great to have a good trip. Also several distilleries (e.g. Garrison Bros) and so many breweries.

This spring we had lots of people from around the country who had to cancel their Napa trips and came here instead.

We love the Hill Country from pedestrian to really good (still haven't made it to Calais yet), and definitely gonna do the Garrison Bros tour next time.

Just also want to do Napa and Sonoma as part of the journey, ya know, before it burns up/falls into the ocean.

Noted. Thanks!

Awesome Riesling (dry) and Chardonnay in the region.

I like:
Weimar (have membership)
Konstantin
Fox Run
Lamoreaux Landing
Red Newt.

Some are better than others. Some views better than others. But, for NY, pretty cool place.

I will second this recommendation.

Hey Cecil - this is the Friday. Can you let me know your contact info so I can reach out and set up something for us?

Great. Email in my profile. Will need to be 3pm or after. Thanks!

Email sent.

If anyone is interested, I have some extra bottles of Piper, Tench, Detert, and SQN available at cost. Email in profile.

Oh, to add to discussion, I picked up some Rivers Marie, Realm Bard (sorry, Cecil), and Cristal recently. Macdonald next week!

BSD said:

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If anyone is interested, I have some extra bottles of Piper, Tench, Detert, and SQN available at cost. Email in profile.

Oh, to add to discussion, I picked up some Rivers Marie, Realm Bard (sorry, Cecil), and Cristal recently. Macdonald next week!

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Nice offer, I wish I was local.

I passed on the recent Rivers Marie and Realm offers, but I grabbed some Ultramarine today. I also have some Myriad, Scavino Barolo, Ridge, Turley, Booker, and Bedrock wines on the way. I was hoping to get some Pott Napa cab this week, but it was gone before I had a chance to grab any.

Ultramarine…nice! I'm still on the waitlist.

I almost forgot, I got a case of Pott before they cut it off.

Weird how so many I know have cycled out of Myriad. Including one winemaker mentioned here recently. Mike has gotten just "too..." for my palate. I kept up Elysian for awhile but have stopped that. Actually used a Myriad Syrah in spaghetti sauce last week!

We still buy a little from Myriad, mainly because Mike is a friend. I honestly haven't had much of the recent stuff to judge how it has changed. I just hope Elysian hasn't gone "too"…

You should get on soon, I had a larger allocation this year, I'm assuming that's due to more production.

I'm hoping. Been on the list since August 2018. Was a tad behind the rush.

BigAg95 said:

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BSD said:

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If anyone is interested, I have some extra bottles of Piper, Tench, Detert, and SQN available at cost. Email in profile.

Oh, to add to discussion, I picked up some Rivers Marie, Realm Bard (sorry, Cecil), and Cristal recently. Macdonald next week!

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Nice offer, I wish I was local.

I passed on the recent Rivers Marie and Realm offers, but I grabbed some Ultramarine today. I also have some Myriad, Scavino Barolo, Ridge, Turley, Booker, and Bedrock wines on the way. I was hoping to get some Pott Napa cab this week, but it was gone before I had a chance to grab any.

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You get Scavino Barolo mailed to you directly? I haven't had much of theirs.. more "modern" in style I believe?

No, I get it through a local shop. It is more of a modern style, and their entry level bottle is very approachable young. Their Bricco Ambroglio was the first Barolo I ever had and is still my favorite Barolo. I get a mixed case every year, usually 4 of their village blend and the rest are single vineyard. The single vineyard wines are more of a traditional style.

what wines do you get from Turley? I like a few of their offerings and grab a couple. only the White Coat and the Judge Bell (Amador) on this recent offering. I generally just buy the few zin offerings from Amador county or Lodi. Have a couple of Napas, too.

Buy some of their higher end single vineyard zins and age them for 5-7 years. Still a little sweet but they'll surprise you how good they are for $45-$70 a bottle. Just need patience.

We always grab a handful of the cheaper ones like the Juvenile and the Eatate, and then a bottle or two of several single vineyard zins to lay down. We've sampled a few of those, and so far like their stuff from Paso better than Napa and Amador, but that makes sense that the Paso wines would drink better young than e.g a Howell Mountain Zin. I really liked their Paso Paper Street zin last year.

We grabbed 4 bottles of 1996 zins from Contra Costa and Napa a couple of years ago, those have been fun to open and share with friends who'd never had an aged zin.

I'll have to check out Judge Bell and White coat, don't think I've tried those yet.

The Paper Street vineyard is becoming very popular in Paso, yet hardly anyone knows about it. It's starting to get the reputation of James Berry, G2, Heart Stone, and Denner.

Some Mourvedre to go with burgers on a Sunday night.

This really sucks. Cheap Tempranillo from Ribera del Duero imported by some outfit in Atlanta. How do you suppose Dan feels a Texas school doing this - I wonder how a Texas school would even know that Tempranillo is associated with Texas? And what about 12 Fires? Aggie redpots making Texas wines and building a brand. Not to mention friggin' Messina Hof. There's plenty of decent and available Texas wine that the TMF could have partnered with. Somebody has their head up their ass.

PRobably more a case of "they asked first" than anything. But I agree, it's not a good look for a Texas school, esp one with MH is their backyard.

I agree, some marketing outfit proposed it and somebody (clearly not a wine person) approved.

It may be a minor betrayal, but a betrayal nonetheless. You gotta hope Paul Bonargio (MH) was at least consulted, but I can't believe he'd support this.

Maybe I'm an outlier, but not really going to let this work me up. In general, when I see an A&M, astros, etc branded bottle of wine I assume it's cheap/crap wine, they put a special label on it so people get excited, and mark up the price 100%.

A friend got me an Astros World Series bottle. It sits on the counter as decoration, not even going to take up the space in my cellar for it.

I mean with what A&M asks for in royalties, I imagine any half decent bottle would have to go for $100+ if they did this.

And there's plenty of cheap Texas wine that could have been sourced. They may have talked to MH, I don't know. I've verified that 12 Fires didn't know anything about it.

Amd displayed on an end cap, so figure $10 goes to HEB. Imported from Spain, so I'm thinking about a $4 bottle of wine.

BigAg95 said:

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No, I get it through a local shop. It is more of a modern style, and their entry level bottle is very approachable young. Their Bricco Ambroglio was the first Barolo I ever had and is still my favorite Barolo. I get a mixed case every year, usually 4 of their village blend and the rest are single vineyard. The single vineyard wines are more of a traditional style.

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Drank a '13 Bricco Ambrogio Barolo from them this weekend. only one I had. drank very nice

Looks like I'm going to Priorat in March! Always been a fan of their wines out there.

Let me know how that one goes. It's on my list after Burgundy which has been on hold for two years now due to travel restrictions.

If you want grenache that's the place to go!